A Week's Time

7 days ago at this very moment (its 9am) my life was still normal and all was fine. good. normal. fine.

That has been the hardest part... redefining my normal, my family, and myself. 

I will never be the same person I was before. And honestly Ill probably be a better person! 

But its hard, really hard, to navigate this new life

and i hate that its hard

and i still dont think its fair

and it still makes me so angry

and i still cry 

but i do smile 

and i LOVE my husband, I knew I loved him but he has been my security blanket, Ive never needed him like this before and he is my safe place and that's a great feeling :) 

Dashtyn is a great distraction! :) 

Chasen is a ray of sunshine his outlook and understanding of this situation is unreal for his age, he is guiding me on this journey and I didn't expect that...I have no idea what I'm doing, but I think Ill take more advice and ques from him.

{this may be a hard read...personal...and maybe to much information. It was not a hard write, I already lived it, and like ive said before its helped me to read other peoples hard to read stories, and so I hope to help others. }

we laid baby to rest on Thursday evening.

but let me back up (as painful as it is I want to remember this event in my life, it is going to be one of the biggest moments of my life and I want to document it as I do everything else)

so Wednesday morning I called the pathology office (all dead babies are sent to pathology to test for genetic abnormalities and such, i haven't gotten the report but in most cases all is normal and you find out you were just one of the unlucky 1 in 4 who miscarried just because.) 

what a weird conversation that was, ... they hadn't done the report yet and thought they would be done that afternoon so we planned to bury baby on wed.but they didnt call.

so when ean got home from work we told Chasen we would have a funeral of sorts for baby and asked if he would like to draw baby a picture 

and he did

first he drew lots of flowers then he wanted to draw a baby doll (and that made me wonder if he thought it was a girl or if he just was drawing a baby) then he picked up the brown maker and laughed and said Im gonna draw something funny and I thought poop, but it was a papi (pacifier) and that just broke my heart. Chasen had thought about this baby and had plans for it too, and that breaks my heart into millions of pieces.

then he turned the paper over picked up a pink crayon and drew the biggest pink castle ever! (with a little help) and then he asked me how to spell 'from' and wrote From: Chasen To: Sadie on it 

and i cried some more, he also thought baby was a girl and that was his name he had pick out when we were talking about names :( 

But he wasn't sad, he did it all with excitement and a smile. he was proud of his picture, as he should be!

thursday morning came and Ean took dash with him to work and I took chasen to school, I had planned to have a prenatal massage that morning and i still went, thank god she didnt remember it was prenatal and didnt say a thing or use the table with the spot for belly.

I had called pathology again at 8am and told them I would be there at 10 to pick up the "tissue" 

Ean offered to go get it, but I wanted to, it wasn't that hard for me .... just a really fucked up scenario.

there will be several sentences to follow that no one should ever have to say and I never thought I would say and the only way to describe them is fucked up so Im sorry for the explicitive but its necessary :)

I called them AGAIN on my way there I just didnt want there to be any wait and I needed to get Chasen at school by 11. 

they were ready and i was there at 10. walked up to the counter and said "im here for....um, Im Abby Caskey" -- "oh! Ill be right back" and she went and got a Dr. took me back to a room introduced us, he told me he was sorry for my loss and i sat down while he explained to me that baby would be in a sealed (but open-able...i never opened it) container but that it wouldn't be in one piece {a sentence i never thought id hear} but I knew all this and it wasn't disturbing or surprising to me at all. he left to go get a tech who got the baby and took me to a different room to sign papers and she apologized when she asked for my ID and I said no worries Id be worried if you didnt ask for my ID. she had a plastic hospital bag with a tiny shoe box sized coffin in it. 

I took my bag (WTF) with baby and walked out of the waiting room and my eyes were so blurry from tears I could hardly see. me and baby got in the car and I cried and screamed (yup i did) and then i drove home and placed baby on the desk and opened the coffin, it was like a hard plastic container with a cross on it and inside baby (who was in a specimen cup) was wrapped in a green blanket. I was surprised how kindly it was all in there i mean i didnt expect the blanket i guess. 

at this point I had about 10min to pull my shit together and go get chasen...just then ean pulled in the driveway, which was good I needed a hug, but he had to go ... he would have stayed if Id asked him to, but he put dash in the car and we went and got chasen.

and i spent the rest of the day with my baby in the house which was weird but i didnt tell chasen it was there. 

later that day Chasen goes mom I made baby a picture today at school. 

I was sad that he had to think about it at school and thats when I decided to email his teacher, she said he was doing good, acting normal. so that was nice to hear.

he had made baby a may day basket (i didnt even realize it was may day)

I could tell he took his time with it I usualy get pictures with a few colors and not all the space filled.

he showed me where he had bows and sparkles (glitter) for baby 

I told him that after his soccer game that night we would go out to the cemetery and bury our baby (never thought that sentence would be one id say)
later that afternoon Chasen and Dash were playing and Dash said something about super hero and Chasen goes Mommy is like a superhero now, and I said why's that? and he said because you have a baby in heaven!

I didnt fully understand what he meant by that until Joellyn offered me sting cheese (we stayed there friday night) and I said "no thanks" and chasen nudges me and goes "oh come on mama give that baby in heaven some cheese!"  He still thinks/believes me and baby are still connected and that is a pretty sweet superhero power and Im gonna go with it. he has completly changed the way I planned to deal with this, hoping to move on eventually. But because of him and his view I think I need to learn to accept and live with it and some how be at peace with it. I will FOREVER have a baby in heaven

we went to the soccer game which was a blur but chasen had a great game scoring one goal and assisted with 2 goals which is a super big deal at this age because they dont like to share!
{while i was at the game I couldn't help but think how not a single person there knew what we were about to do that night. It just really made me think about how you never know what the person next to or across from you is going through so BE KIND} 

and we came home loaded up the car and ate supper in the car on the hour and half drive to the cemetery.

Now, Ean's family owns part of the cemetery so we sorta had permission but im not sure anyone could just go and do  this. but Trista (thank god for her) had dug a small spot for us so we would know where to put baby.

Baby is right next to Ean's aunt Ladonna and right below cousin Joely.

Now is where I want to use the F word a lot because it is so out of this world.

but Ean had a shovel and dug a hole....digging in a cemetery is just weird and we laughed through the whole thing, at one point chasen said he had to pee and i said well if baby was a boy he'd probably laugh and understand if you peed on his grave but you better run over to that field and go!

so he did.

it was windy cold and misty...dash was shivering!

we placed baby in the ground and chasne put his pictures in there too and ean looked at me and I said I had no words and he had written down the most amazing poem and read it for us and then we buried baby and I placed my flowers and orange pinwheel on top. and that was hard.

we went back to the car, it was almost dark and chasen started to bawl, which was a relief in a way because he hadn't cried yet .... and i held him and held him and he didnt want to leave so we went back to the grave and just sat there for a while and I explained to Chasen that baby wasn't alone, we wern't leaving her and that she was having fun in heaven and she wasn't in the dark, or scared or hungry. and that seemed to help him, heaven is hard to understand. how can someone be in the ground but in heaven. and the soul is hard to understand and explain also. 

we got in the car and made sure he was ready to leave and he was ... then we got ice cream and passsssed out hard all in our bed when we got home around 10pm

friday morning i woke up to chasen and dash in my bed (ean left early) and Chasen asked me mom can we go visit the baby after school today, and I said yes but we will have to wait for daddy because I dont know how to get there exactly. and he said ok, I want to take some flowers! and he was off smiling and ready to get dressed like that was the most normal thing he'd ever said.

and that's when I decided that I couldn't go to nebraska on the bus at 3 because i didnt want to miss his first trip back to see baby and I really didn't think I could go and be away from ean for that long.
so i called ean to tell him and you know what he said... "thats ok, you can do whatever you want, we will all drive down with you on Saturday if you want to do that"

so Friday afternoon chasen filled a bucket full of dandelions and blue bells and we left around 5 to head to the cemetery we got there and chasen dumped the bucket out and then placed all the flowers nicely on the dirt and then he stood up, folded his hands and said "ok lets say a prayer" and ean and I were like "uhhhh uhhhh ummmm" and i told him just to say what he was feeling so I hugged him and he said, "baby we miss you and we love you and we hope you are having fun in heaven! amen!"
and i tried really hard not to cry as he was smiling and walking back to the car.
I wish I could be more like him.
as we drove away he said maybe we can come back with grammy tomorrow!

we are hoping to plant a tree or something for him to visit here at home that's a reminder of baby because its a long drive if he wants to visit everyday.
and we told him that heaven is everywhere so he doesn't have to be at the grave to talk to baby, but that it is nice to go and visit from time to time.

so we left sat at 6am for nebraska....more on that later.

Angel Baby Caskey

as many know I have been having spotting since 11 weeks 6days

had an ultrasound that showed all was well at 12 weeks

continued to spot red blood for 5 weeks 

I went in on april 15th (just before my bday) for a heart beat check and they found it!

on April 28th the day before baby would have been 4 mnoths I woke up and just felt awful, exhausted, headache and just empty. Decided that although I had an OB apt in 7 days I couldnt wait that long and went in to have them find the heart beat. I went alone with the boys because even though deeeeeep down i felt all was wrong I didnt want ean to miss work again for a heart beat check where all was well. 

so off we went and that poor nurse spent 30min (her whole lunch time im sure) looking and looking for the heart beat.

during that time dash and chasen were good for about 5min while they ate the candy I brought.

then dash took all the magazines out and threw them all over, screamed, poked the nurse in the butt, kicked chasen in the head, picked /poked a small circle piece out of the exam table and threw it in the trash...*sigh*

that poor nurse then said she was going to get a different nurse to look, but everyone was gone on lunch. no dr no nurses. she got a different doplar and tried for 5min before saying maybe she could find its flickering heart on the ultrasound machine they had before sending be down stairs for an ultra sound.

she kept saying im just a nurse and not familiar with this but just hoping to see the flicker.

while we were in there I held dash for a bit before he got down and tried to sit on a moving cart and hit his head and screamed and cried. 

the nurse showed me the screen and said i know this is the spine and that is the head but I dont see the heart but it could be because i dont know what im looking for or because this is the babies back and its harder to see the heart. I knew then that it was over. she left to go make a phone call to down stairs and I called ean who thank god was in cedar rapids and was there in 25 min. 

I went down to the ultra sound place and went and had the ultrasound alone with the boys (ean was 10 min away at this point) while they spilled all the crackers i had bought in the waiting room on the floor and dash stepped on them.

she scanned for ever and never showed me the screen....again I knew. when she was done she asked how long till my husband as there (another bad sign) and i said any minute she said okay im going to go review these scans while we wait.

she left i tried to clean up the crackers and then Ean walked in. about 2 min later the ultrasound lady came in with another girl (i almost puked) that other girl took the boys out to the play area. 

the ultrasound lady came over to me put her hand on my shoulder and said I wish I had better news, and rubbed my back while I cried and told Ean "I can't do this" and I wasn't even sad I was soo so so SO mad and pissed off. she said the scans had been sent to my dr at the hospital and we would go to a room where she would call me.

we went in there I called my mom and sister and Ean called his. Thank god Joellyn works 10min away (if that) and was able to leave work and was there in 10min with the boys. the phone rang shortly after that and it was the dr. again breaking the news to me. I just remember telling her I wanted the procedure done asap.

thankfully we had planned to eat lunch at the mall after the heart beat check so I hadn't ate since 8am or drank since 11am. She was able to schedule my D&C for 5pm so Joellyn took the boys to our house.
I remember walking out of the office and through the waiting room full of people and they all looked at me shocked, I must have been quite a mess, I can only hope that seeing me made them really cherish the miracle they were about to see on their screen.
and we aimlessly drove around iowa city to a lake for and hour and a half while we waited to go to the hospital. all i wanted to do and still want to do is run away if i didnt have 2 precious boys who needed me we would just runaway! that did and still does seem like the easiest solution!
Ean first drove me to the university and I was like uhhh what are you doing? We were going to mercy, I honestly wish I could have done it at the U because I have bad memories there (not bad care) just memories of infertility and bitterness toward the $$ spent on procedures that didnt work. But felt way more comfortable at my hosp. with my dr.
we got to mercy on time, which i really didnt even care if i was on time, we checked in at the registration desk where the lady was extremely chipper and she knew what was going on because she asked why I was there...but how is she supposed to act toward a lady who just lost her baby. i could tell i made her uncomfortable.
they had some poor guy come escort us upstairs, he walked up to the table and they said you are going to take her to OB and he looked at me kind of confused, Im sure because I didnt look 9mo pregnant and because my face was swollen and red from all the crying. She gave him instructions to go a certian way ... im sure they have protocol in place for these sorts of things and we were on a wing by ourselves no babies crying or birthing moms. Same type of room though ... looked so much like the ones I had after the boys were born and that made me really sad and that is when I wished Id went to the U.
the nurse came in to do my in take papers and started my IV while she was doing that a different nurse came in, A IDIOT, and said they need you in labor and delivery, my nurse looked at me like ohhh my god i can't believe she said that im so sorry, she asked the other nurse how bad they needed her and she said I didnt ask but she said to her, I dont know how to do computer intake so you'll have to log in real quick...in the time she did all that for her she could have finished my intake.... so bitch nurse took over and I almost punched her for being so stupid. my dr came in answered lots of questions we had, the anesthesiologist came in i signed more papers and then a really nice lady came and wheeled me in a bed to the operating room Ean got to walk down there with me and into to recovery area where they gave me pre-sleeping meds in my IV then Ean was gone and they put me out....i dont really remember him leaving or where they wheeled me.
he said he waited 30min before they came out to talk to him and said all went well and that I would be in recovery  for 40min i remember waking up and a nurse was there and i told her I was going to puke so they gave me more anti nausea meds and let me rest before taking me upstarts to the room we started in, Ean was in there a few sec. after I got there and I still felt like puking so they gave me another med in my IV that they said would make me really tired, and it did i fell asleep mid sentence, with a cracker in my mouth....because of that we stayed until 9pm i just kept going in and out of lala land. and finally decided i wanted to go home and sleep. we were home at 10 kids were in bed and I passed out.

I woke up the next morning and felt ok, rested and ok. I remember thinking this isn't so bad....then i got out of bed and as soon as my foot hit the last step of our stairs i was bawling....bawling because the world was still going. kids still needed to go to school and eat and dogs need to pee and cats want fed and my stomach wants food and and and how can the weatherman be giving us the forecast at a time like this he should be grieving too!!!!!
But, Ean made it out the door with both boys and it seriously felt like the biggest accomplishment EVER. Ean called to say he made it to school by 8:19--8:20 is the cut off before you have to walk them in. and then ean met my friend brittany in town and she took dash on the play-date I was supposed to go on to the trampoline park and it was so nice to know dash was off having fun while ean and i moped around the house. Ean picked up the boys and fed them lunch and then we all took a nap before we went to town to get ean's truck that I didnt even relize we left at the OB office. and then I ate away all my feelings at a Chinese buffet!:)

and i felt the same way this morning i thought i was ok, today i made it down the stairs and to the bathroom and didnt cry until after i dropped chasen off at school. Ean had to work this morning and I was on my own, but it wasn't that bad...neither dash or i got dressed, but we will before we go get chasen.

Im going to take Chasen to a friends house to play after school today so Dash and I can come home and nap together. and then chasen has soccer practice....those are the things i dont want to do, I have no idea who knows i was pregnant and I dont want the stares and weird conversations.
tomorrow Ean will be home in the morning and I had already had a prenatal massage scheduled for 8:30 im still going to go ... can't decide if i should call and tell them im not pregnant any more or just roll with it???
then friday I had already had this planned but Im leaving on the bus at 3pm to go home to nebraska to go to the horse races and watch the kentucky derby......and that is when i plan to drink and eat my feelings away :)

and this is the most amount of words i have wrote since my dissertation in college so ....
in conclusion...

its weird to say but ive had a bad feeling since we found out we were pregnant, it seemed to easy that it worked on the first round of fertility treatment, I wasn't sick at all never physically felt pregnant. and then the spotting...I was feeling guilty a couple weeks ago because I didn't feel I had the bond with this baby i did other times I was pregnant. I LOVED AND WANTED this baby with everything I had it just never felt like it was mine. and I think that's because all along it wasn't.

Physically: i feel ok still have an awful sore throat form the tube and my stomach/uterus is really tender but no awful cramping.
Chasen is dealing in his own way...but hes good
and Ean is trying to take care of me. and my crazy hormones...because my body still has to regulate all those pregnancy hormones.

unfortunately i know way to many people who have gone through this and I am in good company.
i appreciate your prayers, kind words, calls, emails and flowers more then I can express right now.

Video's of Chasen's First Meet

but first some cute photos

  the best race of the day

the 400m

200m

this video is with my camera which has a crappy zoom and that will change real soon!! 

this video is with grandmas camera!! -- she got the good zoom from many years of sitting in bleachers/stands far away! I need an upgrade asap!

100m--my camera

100m gma's view!

and thats it! we will do it again in june :)

Chasen's First Track Meet!

Chasen got to compete in his first ever track meet today!! It was one of the best days of my life :)

he even held my hand a lot when we were walking on the field to check in for events

I have been waiting to do this since the day I knew Id marry Ean....sitting in the stands together watching our kids enjoy an event that is/was something ean and i loved doing so much.

I love watching Chasen play other sports but this is something Ean and I have talked about for years "i can't wait to watch our kids run" "me either" .............SO COOL!

 

 

 any way...... Grandma and Alyssa got to come to his meet too! 

and his #1 fan

 first event was long jump and he had never even seen a long jump pit (neither had most other kids his age) but we practiced at home in the sand volley ball court a little the night before and he was doing good! but we didnt have a line he had to jump form so that confused him when we got there and LOTS of kids scratched.

long jump: scratched all 3 tries but nailed it 2 times afterward when he realized he didnt have to touch or jump on all three white lines :) hehee oops! we should have explained that better!

here are 2 videos from 2 different angles of his long jump...so funny! 

getting instructions before the long jump

when he's nervous....hands in pocket...so cute!

 

after jumping he had a hot dog and rested until the 100m which we almost missed. 

they weren't announcing (until later) what age groups were running and when we walked down to go to the bathroom i saw the group he was supposed to be with lined up so ean took chasens sweat pants off and threw him over the fence and he ran the race!

100m: 22.6

start of 100

 he got first in his heat, there were 2 heats, and the 2nd heat was faster, we think he got 5th overall.

next up was the 400... I was a little nervous for him...it seems so long and really is hard! 

here he is doing some stretching :) 

 400m: 1:54

the start of the 400

there were 4 kids in his age group (6 and under) signed up for the race but only Chasen and another boy had the 'guts' to run it! and it was an amazing race they were pretty much neck and neck the entire time and it was probably the best race of the day everyone was cheering and some kids were cheering for "little red" he got done and was little upset he didn't win but happier when I told him he still get a medal! he walked over to Ean and said "my stomach hurts and my side, I might throw up" SO PROUD he ran his heart out and didnt give up. I told him if he feel like that he did it right!

last year we did the growl prowl 5k and they have a 400m at the end for kids and chasen ran it and was getting passed so he slowed way down...didnt quit but did slow down this time he gave it his all! 

200m: 48.5

he was in heat 2 which ended up being the fastest and got 2nd place!!! 

 here he is getting his medal in the 400m

and his medal in the 200

he said his favorite race of the day was the 100 

and is really excited to try the long jump again

he said he wants to do the next race in june and do all the same events! CAN'T WAIT!! 

I will post more videos of the running later!

Chicago Vacation

we left for chicago on the friday before easter, a little family-happy30thbday-get away!

we had plans to park in one place and and walk lots but due to my current condition and spotting allllll the time we spent lots more on parking and Ean (love him to death he is the BEST!!) dropped me and chasen off at the door step of every event and in some cases walked 2 miles while carrying dash.

 

the game was absolutely freezing, not sure what i was thinking...we snuggled a lot and seriously could have used gloves hats and winter coats!

 chasen was so amazed we could see the "michigan ocean"

 we enjoyed hot dogs and hot chocolate!!

Ean and Dash left after the 7th inning stretch and chasen and I stayed a bit longer and met them across the street at mc donalds where i ordered more hot chocolate because it was seriously that cold!

Ean dropped me and all the boys off and we checked into our hotel which was very modern, kinda swanky and not meant for kids, but because it is the closest hotel to navy pier there were tons of families there.

 this light fixture....yah not for kids we are so thankful it didnt break when dash hit it!

 after checking in I laid down and we watched tv before walking a block to eat dinner

on the way out we checked out the view (our room view was of the city)

chasen thought maybe the shadows were of giants!! 

when we got back I took another rest while the boys went down to swim. 

I went and watched for a bit

the pool was 4ft then to 8ft deep...not for kids! 

the Ferris wheel all light up!

i left before they were done swimming and had a nice relaxing shower with their awesome smelling soaps!

the boys joined the relaxation too

dash enjoyed a glass of water and the spa magazine 

the next morning I laid around until about 9am while the boys watched cranes work in the city on high rise buildings!! 

ean left to go get the car and i met him outside with the kids, we found parking about a blk and a half from navy pier, this was probably the most walking i did around navy pier. all of the riders were under construction but we saw a ship that chasen said I bet they found that pirate ship on the bottom of the ocean and painted it!

 then chasen and ean did a crazy mirror maze with smoke, all mirrors and black lights

dash and i waited and waited, the guy said it usually took 15 - 20 min....it took them 30-35 they both came out frustrated but had fun!

 then we ate at billy goats tavern "cheezbourger, cheeps no fries" home of the SNL skit 

it was fun, loud and good!

 then we drove to the sears tower ean dropped me and chasen off and went to park,

meanwhile I found out the line was 2 1/2 hours long so i called ean but he had already paid to park.

so we were waiting!! Ean decided to run across the street to panera for cookies and coffee....well the line was moving and i wasn't going in with out him so i let 30 or so people pass us!! but it wasn't to bad to wait, i had to pee at one point and ean let another 20 people pass us. Im not sure id do it again, but it was fun!

we went out on the glass ledge and chasen was scared!!!!

he's afraid of heights anyway

 dash didnt care he laid down when i asked him to!

after this we went and ate some amazing stuffed pizza

then ean drove home while I put my feet up!

we were home by 9pm and up at 7am for Easter service before heading to north english!